Saturday, December 8, 2012

Shine Supper Club: Sourdough Sugar Cookies

A lot of years ago (in fact, I think I
was still in junior high), I finished a batch of Christmas sugar
cookies. Being home alone at the time, I decided to be nice and bake
a new batch. I went to town with a cookie cutter and sanding sugar.
My mother wasn't at all upset that she got hardly any out of the
batch I finished – she was more impressed by the cookies. It's
been a tradition of mine to ever since to bake her sugar cookies
before Christmas ever since. And with the Shine Supper Club doing
holiday dishes, I decided to share my tradition.

For a few years, I deviated from that
tradition a little, baking sourdough soft pretzels and rolling them
out like cookies (still topped with sanding sugar though!), thanks to
my new-found love of sourdough baking and my lack of sourdough sugar
cookies. Now I happened to find a sourdough sugar cookie recipe.
Perfect.

I used the almond variation of this
recipe, and omitted the frosting. I'm not against frosting, but who
needs the extra calories this time of year? Fortunately, these
cookies are sweet and soft enough to go without it.

Bake 10 to 12 minutes or until very lightly browned (for me, it
was about 15 minutes, but my cookies were on the large side). Remove
from oven and cool on wire racks.
When cool, frost and decorate as desired.

Other than taking a little longer than specified to bake (and 90
minutes was not quite enough time to chill!), I can't tell you how
pleased I am with these cookies. Coupled with my Sourdough Chocolate
Chip Cookies (and another recipe I've made for Sourdough Surprises,
coming up on December 20th!), these are perfect for an
all-sourdough cookie tin.

And on that note...how did one lonely red grain of sanding sugar
get on this green Christmas Tree?